The aborigines of South-eastern Australia believe that a man
may be injured by burying sharp fragments of quartz, glass, and so
forth in the mark made by his reclining body; the magical virtue of
these sharp things enters his body and causes those acute pains
which the ignorant European puts down to rheumatism. We can now
understand why it was a maxim with the Pythagoreans that in rising
from bed you should smooth away the impression left by your body on
the bed-clothes. The rule was simply an old precaution against
magic, forming part of a whole code of superstitious maxims which
antiquity fathered on Pythagoras, though doubtless they were
familiar to the barbarous forefathers of the Greeks long before the
time of that philosopher.
4. The Magician's Progress
WE have now concluded our examination of the general principles of
sympathetic magic. The examples by which I have illustrated them
have been drawn for the most part from what may be called private
magic, that is from magical rites and incantations practised for the
benefit or the injury of individuals.
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